Almost everyone admits to hunger during the Opera.... Hunger is so exalting that during a last act you practically levitate.

... artists were intended to be an ornament to society. As a society in themselves they are unthinkable.

Darling, I don't want you; I've got no place for you; I only want what you give. I don't want the whole of anyone.... What you want is the whole of me-isn't it, isn't it?-and the whole of me isn't there for anybody. In that full sense you want me I don't exist.

The wish to lead out one's lover must be a tribal feeling; the wish to be seen as loved is part of one's self-respect.

The story must spring from an impression or perception pressing enough to have made the writer write. It should magnetize the imagination and give pleasure.

Almost everybody wore a curious limpidity of expression, like newborn babies or souls just after death. Dazed but curiously dignified.... after a criseof hysterical revulsion and tiredness, I passed beyondand became entered by a rather sublime feeling.

very young people are true but not resounding instruments.